


A Child Was Lost

by verymerrysioux



Series: Postman!Warriors [6]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Warriors
Genre: Gen, Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda), Postman!Warriors, mailman!Link, postman!Link
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 22:27:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29178717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verymerrysioux/pseuds/verymerrysioux
Summary: Young Link can't stay in his era, no matter how much they both want it. So the kid asks a small request before he leaves.
Relationships: Time & Warriors (Linked Universe)
Series: Postman!Warriors [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1807576
Comments: 2
Kudos: 76





	A Child Was Lost

**Author's Note:**

> I recommend reading [For Want of A Letter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29055111) first.

It's the first in his life that he regrets loving books. Knowledge steeped into his entire being from years curling up on his bed (or a chair, or may, or even the bare floor itself) reading a book from the precious stack he has. From science to magic, religion to philosophy, writing to arts. Any book he had within his reach would be read, their words consumed.

(Perhaps he would have done well as a librarian, or a writer, or even a scholar in one of Hyrule’s academies—but to be able to send letters, to bridge gaps between people, is just as wondrous as delving into worlds built with words.)

A personal favorite of his was history. History books were the ones his mother read to him when they both lived in the manor and his father was around. The few things he allowed her to do with his spare heir.

She had learned to squeeze in logic and practicality into her doting habits. Father abhorred softness, and she had to be crafty in showing her love. Just so father would let her into her children's lives, even just a little bit. History as bedtime stories, flower language to increase his appeal to future suitors, basic magic theory, and even the few dances she knew—insisting practice would bring about grace and elegance a noble should have.

(This was only for her second son, as with the first she made too many mistakes that had his father pull him away from her—unwilling to infect his chosen heir with softness.)

Besides his mother, books were the only ones who didn't talk back to him. There were no sneers, no demands to act appropriately, no glares of disappointment. They gave him sanctuary from all of that. Gave him quiet, gave him peace, gave him worlds he could escape in.

They gave him knowledge that helped him in the war. When one grows up with history, when one pursues more history books once they have freedom to do so, it becomes laughably easy to pinpoint what era they were in.

But now he wishes he was ignorant. He wishes he had a barrier of stupid he could conjure that could bounce off all the logical arguments Lana threw at him when he tried to make Young Link stay.

He doesn't want a little boy to go back to his home and be miserable, he doesn't know what Young Link will do if he goes back. All alone, with no home to go back to. 

Run away, maybe? It's what he did. But where would he go? Young Link talked of looking for someone, and he knows from history books that whoever that was didn’t take him back (or didn’t come back at all). 

And he wouldn't be able to jump through time, he won’t be able to jump through the portals. He suspects Lana will make sure of that.

It wouldn't stop him. Young Link is a boy who's gotten a thread of happiness, he'd do anything to keep it with him. And if he fails, he’ll just try harder. Even risk his life for it. He knows, he's done it.

So he tries to make him stay.

Lana uses his greatest strength against him. His well of knowledge, his lack of ignorance, his ever-working mind. The Hero of Time was an important figure, not just with his feats of defeating Ganondorf and other enemies, but his uncanny luck and skill of uniting the different races in Hyrule. He can't keep up with his stubborn streak when his brain tells him he's being stupid. Risking too much.

To pluck the Hero of Time is to rip off a foundation in Hyrule's future, he doesn't need Wisdom to see that.

(Maybe Wisdom would help him see another way, but he and the princess only tolerate each other for the sake of being professional.)

So he fails.

And on the last days before the displaced are returned to their eras, he reads to Young Link all the stories he can. Both of them curled up in a nest of blankets in their tent, from morning until the dead of night. Young Link doesn't ask, he knows once he shows off the new collection of storybooks he bought in the Bazaar.

Books are his escape, and in time, it became Young Link's escape as well. A reprieve from the harsh truth called reality.

"The postmen are still jumping in portals, right?" Young Link asks, clinging tight to his scarf.

He closes the book and reaches for the next one. "Last I saw, yes," he replies.

Dungo seemed to be a regular in inter-dimensional deliveries the same way Zomo was a constant messenger in the army, and both were still doing deliveries last week.

"And I'm better in your era's script now."

"More than better, you’re ahead of kids your age, even older," he states proudly, smiling as pink stains Young Link's cheeks as he gives a shy smile. He'll give praise whenever he can, he won't demand he do better for the sake of being strong (and he refuses to believe that being gentle is a weakness, father has been wrong about many things). Power came with a cost, and Young Link already lost too much.

"Maybe I could send you letters? And... and you can send me some too?" He feels the familiar tugs of Young Link twisting and pulling at his scarf. "I know a place that has a whole address, since they deliver milk and eggs... so you could address it there? And I know the year and date too! So... so… write to me?"

He nearly gets a paper cut as his hand slips when turning a page.

(When he was young, he knew his mother was near her limit with father's cold treatment, a decade in a suffocating household and trudging on in a loveless marriage—he knew she would disappear, and he asked that she at least write to him once she does.)

“Of course.” He hugs Young Link tight. "I'll deliver them myself if I have to."

(She kept her promise.)


End file.
